


evig eies kun det tapte

by slire



Category: Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms, Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Brutality, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Historical, Hypocrisy, M/M, Martyrdom, Middle Ages, Other, References to Christian Religion & Lore, References to Norse Religion & Lore, inspired by the art of Theodor Kittelsen, the beginning of Denmark-Norway and (later) the Kalmar Union
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-21
Updated: 2015-06-21
Packaged: 2018-04-04 18:16:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4147929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slire/pseuds/slire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set 1349 → 1350 AD. During the Black Plague ⅔ of Norway's population perish. </p><p>After a year of wandering his country looking for God(s), he seeks sanctuary in Copenhagen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	evig eies kun det tapte

**Author's Note:**

> experimenting with telling stories beneath the surface + showing instead of telling. 
> 
> the title is a quote from Henrik Ibsen's Brand: _"eternally owned is only the lost. "_ the art is Theodor Kittelsen's, like stated in the tags. historical notes at the end. [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmkCn2zr-6o) is a link regarding some background music that definitively sets the mood, if not only because of what starts at 17:02

It has become a ritual, even if bringing faith into this prompts discomfort in Norway . Still, it is I) done with fixed methods of operation, II) repeated and III) religious in nature because the very age is stained with religion, just like the streets are stained with excrement and animal guts.

The room is approximately four fathoms—armfuls—long and broad. Its high price is because of lessor Lund's oath of secrecy and promise of sewage disposal/chamber pot emptying. The house lies in the baker quarters of Nidaros, a market city in the country's centre. The house itself is an  _oppstugu_ , as in a loft on top of a three-room layout with an  _allrom_ (family room), a  _forstue_ (a big entrée) and a  _kleve_ (a chamber, used as a larder or bedchamber). It's in the loft, the rare second floor, that Norway stays. There are no windows. Light comes from a steady supply of candles. There are shelves are jars filled with fruit preserves and vegetables; bins with rye flour; ropes of wild mushrooms and boxes of root fruits; sacks of salt and wheat; herbs and spices; salted fish and dried meat; aqua vita and variations of Germanic moonshine. Manuscripts, ink drawings, runes on stone, Norse poems on parchment, the Bible. Furniture, sparse but enduring. All is systematically preserved and ritually gone through. Here he will sleep, eat, read and pray.

Norway's tenancy is accepted as long as he keeps the gold coming, as he has for generations. It is no wonder: disasters and diseases come and go, some small, some big. He fears the diseases most, as illness can be far more dangerous than wild animals or war. The diseases never match the Plague of Justinian but Norway takes no chances. He is uncertain if he carries the miasma but vows not to take the chance. If he feels the signs, like he does currently, he retreats to his loft(s). He has one in Tønsberg, one in Bjørgvin, one in Lahelle, a dozen cabins spread in rural areas, and keys to Denmark's own loft in København and Iceland's cellar in Reykjavik and his little brother's other cabins. Sometimes, he goes in there just to think, and has done it a lot lately, faced with problems like an impotent king, a weakening kingdom, and a clash of tradition and faith. Norway would worry about his unreturned letters to fellow Countries and his Colonies, too, but in his current condition his mind is occupied by one single thing: the feeling of existential **dread**. 

Norway bolts the door and prays to the old gods and the new.

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The denial is over. His people are dying.

The abrupt awakening fills him with icy and absolute certainty like a universal truth. He thinks it began in Bjørgvin (his hands; thinning, purpling, fingernails dyed ink black) and Kristiania (his heart; slowing, clogging, rotting). His coastal cities went first, causing his edges to have a blueish tint. Ill, foreign seamen were carried onto his land and their corpses were thrown in the gutters until the nightmen—knackers—carried them away, but it was too late. Norway has felt Her presence from the start, like some ancient god, but not even Lucifer or Loke could match that level of destruction. Foolishly, he'd dismissed Her as a phantom pain from his loss of Norse Religion. It'd struck him hard when Olav the Holy had christened his country with a Bible in one hand and an axe in the other, presenting a simple choice: baptism or death. Obviously Norway's head had rolled several times until he yielded. He wears a cross, yes, but he's also made Iceland scar runes into his flesh. 300 years have passed and he is still not over it.

However, this is not just a disease. This is a plague. A Great Plague.

Norway abruptly stands up and surveys the damage.

"Helvette."

Yes, "hell" is quite a good description of his current condition. He looks to be in the early stages of the pest. His hands remain horrifying, twisted and black, and he nearly coughs his chest apart in an attack that lasts roughly 30 seconds. Lifting his robe reveals a grotesque sight; his groin is swollen with buboes, round welts, huge and filled with fluid. He knows that certain cities affect certain places in or on his body. He will not ponder why his groin is infected because unclean thoughts jars with his Christian learnings. The amount of flea bits unnerves him. He beats the sheet with a fist, once, and lice trickle out like water. He needs to get out of here. The bolts and planks are removed easily enough, but it surprises him to find the door locked from the outside as well. This is not part of the agreement. He uses Viking techniques to smash the door to pieces using a chair. He almost thinks he sees someone in the staircase, but it must be the plague messing with his mind. 

Norway greets the woman of the house, but discovers after a moment she's still for a reason. She sits at the table, flaxen hair greasy, head downcast and a tankard in her rotting hand. Thankfully the stench is kept subdued by the spring cold. She must've been dead for days. It is upon checking the _kleve_ , the bedchamber, he finds the children. Tucked in. Kissed goodnight. Holding hands into death. The Lund family is a rich one; they had money for poison. The father is nowhere to be seen. Norway has to find a watchman to deal with them. He sings an Ave Maria while collecting some of her jewelry, silver ornaments and a confirmation knife; goods for her to take with her to Valhall, a skjoldmøy, a warrior woman. Norway is his women as well as his men and this one fought to cease her children's suffering. Religions see divinity in suffering but Norway is too old not to wonder. 

There are rats everywhere. He readies a satchel, quickly. Takes some food, money, his tent, his Bible. He can walk, of course, stable—except when he bends over and coughs up a liquid Greece had once described to him as phlegm; ¼ bodily humours that explains Norway's apathy. But sometimes, the liquid is black, black bile, and then he must admit his melancholia. 

His people are dying. The feeling of existential dread will not let go.

 

 

 

Nidaros' streets are the worst. It is the silence that haunts him. Gone are the carts with wares to the public houses and markets, the carts with hogsheads and beer barrels, the stagecoaches with dark shapes behind the window panes and shouting coachmen who crack the whip at loud stressed animals, warriors and watchmen that match with loud boots and eyes that stare emptily in front of them. Men who carry slaughtered geese, hens and rabbits over their shoulder. Boys who sing stanzas of song they've learned the same morning. Whores, hand in hand, laughing and hissing at the finer ladies holding their noses demonstratively. Gone, gone, gone.

What is left is the shit. The stones are as slick as soap, covered in some indefinable film. Why disease is more active in heated areas, he does not know, but he imagines Her roaming his city, looking for a face to lick. She must've followed the city light. But the touches are all gone now. The houses are bolted shut, just like his own was. The strangers he meet are all uncooperative and runs away once he nears them. The fear of death destroys their love for their country, and his words have no effect. He instinctively knows She isn't here, but the death smell is so thick he has trouble breathing. He must find someone who knows more than what he does. All Norway knows is that his cities, his villages... All are dying or dead. He slips on the stones and there's a hole in his boot, soaking him with a material whose contents he does not wish to know. It takes a while for him to get up. Up and out. He kisses the corpses he passes, slowly repeating a multitude of passing rites with songs and poems mixing Norse and Latin, but the stench is horrible and he elects to try serve the living, not the dead. There is a widening hole in his belly worse than any pain. He wants to suffer so that they can live. Bruised – strung up – stretched – entered. Entrails drawn out, body broken, quartered flesh cooked so God can permeate to the bones and he can be scattered and wrapped in gold.

Norway finds his informer regarding the bonfires outside Nidaros. He sees the corpses burning. He feels his country's paranoia. Are they burning living people, too? There's a good chance of it. Oh, if only he could burn instead. To roast slowly over coals until the skin cracks and falls away, livid red muscle and weeping sloughs, white bone moist and exposed, allowed to breathe. Anything to fill the hole. Eroticism wouldn't begin to describe it.

His informer is the first man who doesn't run upon seeing him, roughly forty years old, a harelipped individual with an iron-coloured tooth, clad in wool.. A grin; a flash of iron. " _God morgen,_ " he greets, northern accent thick. He's from Finmark. Pious, perhaps? Hungry for blood?

"Good morning," Norway repeats. "Which month are we in?"

"Odd question. We're in February." The man smirks, harelip contorting it. "Had you locked yourself in, perhaps? Too bad Pesta gets in everywhere."

"Who?" Norway asks, but the knowing that comes into existence makes his voice hollow. The knowledge is a birth, full of blood and slime and his screaming mouth pressed into a sheet dipped in alcohol and perfume. In his vision, he's the one screaming, and Pesta enters and smiles from between his legs. Pesta is no mere winter flu. Pesta is a great plague, an epidemic unlike no other, and so Myth latches onto her like it does to him.

"Yup. Dressed in a dirty black cloak, wearing an old woman's face, and you heard the saying, right? Pesta either carries a broom or a rake. If she carries a rake, a few  survives. If she carries a broom..."

"...Then everybody dies," Norway finishes. The personification has become internalized like his trolls and fairies. His people believe in Her, just like they believe in God and Death, so he does, too. "Which did she carry in Nidaros?"

"Hard to say. But word says the plague travels fast, like nothing before, because Pesta shapeshifts into a huge black raven. Priests say it's a punishment from God, so they've started burning people again—dead, mostly—when they're not whipping themselves to death. There are rumours of sacrifices to Odin." He scratches his ear. "Now I don't know if it's some god, or miasma, or whatever... But if you're looking for answers, well... They say there came a ship to Bjørgvin." Norway thinks he felt it in Hamar first, but he knows better than to dismiss myth. "The sick men onboard a ship were taken into the city... and you know the rest."

"Yes. I do." Myth becomes truth. Oh, Bjørgvin. His rain-slicked cod-stinking coastal pride in international trade. Of course it had to start there. Pride was the thing that sent Lucifer down, screaming, his white wings burning black. Norway had only ever bent for the axe during his numerous beheadings. Was this his punishment? "How long does it last?"

"Hm? The pest? Well, three to eight days, I'd say. Sometimes longer. Sometimes less." Norway's eyes widen, and he is unable to respond. "Now, I need to underline that I don't blame anyone for this. I am not malicious, nor cynical, but I am pitiless. A priest told me it was all part of God's plan, but I know he lied. He didn't believe what he said even if he'd liked to. His white priest dress was up to the knees in blood and mud, and I think he had the plague, like so many who wander from home to home looking to help." 

"How did you know he was a liar?"

The man's eyes hold a knowledge only experience can grant. "Knowing the signs of a liar can save and give you grief, so I will give you three." Three is a very important number, in faith or fairy tale. Norway approves his decision and nods. The man continues, "Excess detail regarding intent. An attitude of reasonableness in the face of implied silliness. The inability to hear a polite refusal." 

"Thank you." They watch the bonfires together. The smell is strangely soothing—reminds him of a different time, a better time, where dead men were sent to Valhalla with ornaments and ships and thralls. These people die nameless, in heaps. Well, it is better than to let them rot in the earth, in Norway's opinion. Denmark had once stated that _wind travels; mud does not_. "How come you don't run?"

"I've seen the running. They don't get far. The nightmen die quickly, so we don't have time for peeling up the bodies outside the cities. The ones inside are enough. If the plague doesn't stop soon, the bodies are gonna clog the cities too."

"How come you don't run from _me_?" Norway is aware how he looks.

The man pauses. He pulls his scarf further down. The round welts are all over his neck, oozing an opaque substance. He doesn't need to say anything more.

 

 

The paths and tracks overlap and twist through an unruly terrain full of hills and forests. Norway is his people more than he is his nature, but a soul will always be shaped by the body wrapped around it, whether the body of a weathered peasant or a doughy noble. The forests are thick and ancient. Norway can go hours without seeing the sky. He finds himself seeking the dark spots, the untouched natural landscapes. There's a lesser chance of dead bodies here. He still feels the pain of death and disease, though, and the dread worsens for every step he takes closer to Bjørnvin. A low rumbling in his ears, spiking his instincts, telling him to turn. A _Hulder_ stare impassively at him from between the trees. Like his pixies and trolls, they rarely speak to him nowadays. His priests tell him _Huldrer_ are the hidden children of Eve ( _"And as God said, what is hidden shall remain hidden"_ , but he did not kill them, oh so merciful and great), while other claim they're the brood of Lilith. He is constantly torn between the ages. He still remembers battling both England and France, and slicing an arm of the latter and naming his newly acquired land Normandie. Sometimes he must pause his wandering to vomit blood, and he utilises a cane—a torn-off branch—to lean on, slow and exhausted. His head, previously filled with ideas and nationalism, is empty. Time passes and while the plague continues to play with him—but it does not kill him. He does not ponder about this anymore. He leaves it up to God. Getting to Bjørnvin takes two weeks. 

Bjørnvin's bonfires are bigger than Nidaros'.

More people are dead here, then. The rumbling increases, dread heightening. Norway isn't quite certain why he's compelled to come here. Does he wish to reason with Her? This Great Plague he knows nothing about, yet She stands so close to him? Shall he summon all his strength and magic to chase Her out? He wants to be bruised by God. He wants to be strung up in a strong light and singled out. He wants to be stretched, like music wrung from a dropped seed. He wants to be entered and picked clean.

It is outside one of the houses he sees it: the rake left outside. This can only mean that for this particular house, she employs the broom—total destruction and death. He imagines her in the corner of the room, raising a skeletal hand towards a family, and suddenly rats pour out from the walls and and the family dies, weeping, the children first, then the adults, if suicide doesn't come to them first. Maybe there will be only one left to tell the tale. A child, perhaps, orphaned and alone in the world. If She doesn't get it then starvation or abuse will. Men go crazy. Ill lusts prevail. Here in the cities there are children who drink a higher percentage semen than water. Norway grits his teeth. How dares She? 

And then in the house's window... 

A ghastly face, sticking its tongue out at him.

Goosebumps erupts on him like on skinned poultry, and he feels one of the buboes on his crotch  **pop**. Its liquid runs down his thigh and knee like piss. He can't move. _'Oh yes,'_ he suddenly understands, an apathetic moment in the midst of a meltdown, _'fear—it's been a long time, old friend.'_ While the dread warps into terror, Norway runs for his life.

 

 

In search for reason and faith, Norway returns to his nature. He struggles with himself and he's dying. There seems to be multiple variations of the plague, and he has them all. The fevers, coughing fits, vomiting and diarrhea come in intervals. It's been a while since he had to defecate in the woods, squatting to shit, hunkered down, knees wide, ass hanging, balls dangling. "Somebody make it stop," he groans, delirious. 

Legend and myth and tradition have been his foundation stones for centuries. They are what made him what he is. They are what supported him throughout his expansions, his warriors having spiritual advantages over Christians in their thirst for Valhall. It's been 3000 years since his christening. Yet folklore and Norse mythology lives and echoes in his language, history, politics, and in place and citizen's names... He can't let go. He can speak Latin fluently and pray to the correct God but in the back of his mind, in his quiet moments...

I: He tries the mountains first. "Let me in," he begs the mountain doors, but they remain shut. No groaning trolls or singing sirens. He beats his fists bloody (better red than black) knocking, screaming for the first time in years. He is a guest here no longer. The creatures on the other side belong to a world he has left behind. He must follow his people.

II: Then there are clearings in the forest, and foundations left by old fortresses and castles. He doesn't remember the rituals as well as before, but he tries. Offerings of candles, seeds, nuts, coins... Small statues—some human, other not—with plinths where dead animals in winter skins hang, turning the shrines into altars. Strong odours erupt from bowls of alcohol or blood or ink. _"...Odin, Vili, Ve..."_ Sometimes travelers join him, dancing naked and diseased with him in the moonlight.

III: He chooses churches and chapels, inland and on the coast, to pray to the new god, Gud, and to Jesus Kristus, the Holy Spirit, and Maria. Of saints he chooses Sebastian, and his own Olav Den Hellige, Sankt Sunniva, Sankt Hallvard, Sankt Trifon, Sankt Øystein, Sankt Torfinn, Sankt Ragnvald Orknøyjarl and Sankt Magnus Orknøyjarl. Here, too, people join him. He tells one priest that he's seen pest-infected mothers carry babies into rivers. The priest replies that nature is Satan's Church.

In the end it all jumbles together.

Norway takes to wandering deeper, going from village to village, looking for help. The stench is enough to tell him whether there are dead or not. A few, especially those further west, are isolated and locked up tight—Norway knows that there's probably nasty shit going on behind locked doors. People get scared and crazy. One villager shoots an arrow at him as he nears, and he dies from the rot and infection, but returns to life afterwards, looking worse than ever. The buboes cover the entirety of his neck, armpits, crotch and surrounding areas, leaking pus. His joints ache, and he's nauseous and feverish, frequently hallucinating. A toe is missing, and he wraps his feet in scavenged rawhide to avoid frostbite and discovery. He soon steals a cloak to cover his entire body, a wandering corpse, quietly signing old folk songs. He is mistaken for a ghost and nobody talks to him anymore.

It _here_ he encounters Jostedalsrypa.

Jostedal is situated in a vale with tall mountains and a glacier nearby. Permanent settlement over centuries is doubtful. The surrounding lands are pastures, vegetation cleaned away, with goats and sheep and horses wandering as aimlessly as Norway himself. No shepherds in sight. He uses the opportunity to milk it straight into his mouth. It's considered indecent but he doesn't care. They say fresh milk can keep seamen from mutiny. It is true. He feels refreshed after a mouthful. Jostedal itself is another village abandoned by God. He counts 24 small farmhouses, including some with architecture dating back to the Viking Age. He sees corpses so rotten all that's left are slivers of skin. By the looks of the scattered weaponry and walls they must've tried to isolate themselves, and failed. He can sense strong emotions here, with someone bringing the illness in, and the paranoia and death and war that followed. A tale nobody's left to tell.

He thinks he sees a pixie and freezes. Have they come back to him?

No, it's better than that! It's a child! A girl, by the looks of it, hair red and boisterous around her like a flame or a halo. She walks among the houses, wide-eyed and earth-kissed. She doesn't stare emptily in front her like Pesta's victims do. She's alive, and healthy, even when her whole village had died. He doesn't wish to infect her, but alone, up here, she will die. However, like a little bird she runs when he comes near. " **Stop**!" he yells with a voice that has commanded armies. Children don't listen to anything but fairy tales. She stops. It takes him a moment to see that she's not looking at him—she's looking behind him.

"No," he chokes.

"Run!" he cries. 

"Get away from me!" he screams as he whips around, ready to take the girl's place, face to face with a black whorl of cloth and a pair of staring eyes. He can't run any longer, and panic warps his already delirious mind. She is on top of him, miasma incarnate, black smoke that fills his sky and renders him blind. Icy hands touch his body, more than just two, almost sexual, but more than that, leaving liquid trails—blood or shit—from their feverish touching. His clothes are gone. There is nothing between him and Her. The pain is intense. His last defenses break and he's left open to the plague, left open to her to ravish and destroy. Is this what entering Hell feels like? Or is it Heaven, not sustainable for the living? His soul is not yet dead, he knows, and so in Heaven his skin would burn, his eyes and nose and mouth bleed, and his internal organs explode. Has he shredded his vocal cords, screaming? The pain grows to the level of a thousand barbed fishhooks tearing through his soul leaving nothing in the world but the pain and a voice. 

**"Tonight I am your God."**

Norway understands and ceases to resist immediately. The grime in his thoughts is scrubbed away, leaving clarity. His myths and legend and lore and gods, old and new,the true nature of death, and places and his place within them and—

And. 

 

** **

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Norway awakens in the snow some time later, with a feeling that he must get away.

The clarity he once possessed is gone—all that is left is a battered, broken vessel, full of seeping holes. The aftermath. There is an almost erotic quality to his exhaustion. Like he's been desired, eaten up, consumed. Spit out. Like he was only able to taste death, not remain. Erotic, but bigger than sex, a mightier orgasm. His voice is raw, but he believes that the screaming went from terror to praying in an instant. The satchel is torn to shreds, along with the prose, paper and parchments spread in the snow, soggy and unreadable. Strangely, his clothes remain whole.

But he cannot stay here any longer. His defeat is on his swollen tongue and he realizes he's lost. He cannot remember what Pesta showed him, but it was not pleasant. It was a knowledge he has no words for. He does not blame the supernatural any longer. He huddles alone in the dark, and even if there aren't any gods to save him. He shivers in the damp mild wind blasts coming over mountains and sneaks in through the seams of his worn clothes. His tongue pokes against an incisor that keeps on giving in to scurvy, bowels in turmoil, he feels diarrhea trickle ominously through his intestines, the sphincter muscle quivering anxiously. His feet gurgling in marsh water from the trek. It is a pleasant feeling. It takes the sting out of the other bodily frailties crying in chorus to remind him of his own mortality. Lukewarm water gurgle between his toes when he bends and stretches them in the greased leather boots.

He goes to visit an old friend.

He isn't quite sure what he seeks but it feels like he must.

(The hole in him, however, won't go away.)

Making someone take Norway over the sea proves difficult, but not impossible. The crew he chooses are already infected, but refuse to die anywhere else than the sea. He's awoken during the night by people being thrown over board and splashing into the sea. There aren't enough coffins. When the captain finally goes and receives the last one, the holes made in the coffin aren't big enough and it floats, drifting away, lost in the North Sea. But later that night, someone hears something bang against the ship's side and sure enough it's the floating coffin. The captain refuses to leave his post. Someone crosses himself. Norway would do so too, but he's too busy retching. 

 

 

There is no one who meets him at the wharfs of København. Denmark doesn't know he's coming. København is not shining or roaring with life, but it is better than most of Norway's cities and villages. He can still see people out and about. The few watchmen there are do not bother him. They avoid him just like his own citizens do. But it is a breath of fresh air, no longer being able to look inside these people's head like he can with his own. The Danish language comes easily to him, switching his harsh _t_ s to soft  _d_ s ( _"It's like speaking with your mouth full of mashed potatoes,"_ Sweden once said), asking a prostitute for directions. It is a cheap district, and like that they accept him. Tiredly, she exhibits her wares, a pest victim like himself. Too bad he's too weak. A soft and pink rump would do him good. The phantom pains of his own country remain (he is slightly dragging a foot behind him and cannot flex the fingers on one hand) but he prefers pain to an errant mind. The people who owns Denmark's loft are more alive than his are. Only gold—and a royal seal—can persuade them to let him in. He knocks on the door. The wood is rotten and bends under his fist, causing a few splinters. He doesn't feel them. 

"Danmark." 

Roughly 1.5 seconds passes before Denmark opens the door in what would've been a slam had he been stronger. 

"Norge." He inhales the name and muggy hall air, then inhaling through his nose along with a fuckload of snot, ribcage jutting. Maybe his lungs are rotten? He certainly looks better externally than Norway did, even if his fingers were black he still had all his fingers. He says, "You look like shit." The incoming hug is one of desperation. Like they try to engulf each other. 'Become one'; shitty joke only Russland would find funny. They stay like that, Denmark's arm slung over Norway's shoulder, Norway's grip looser, but only because of state. If he'd healthy he'd dug his fingernails (claws) so hard into Denmark's back he would bleed and grin and take it. It looks more like they're attempting to strangle each other than embrace. When Norway moves away, grimacing, Denmark frowns. "Is it bad?"

"Worse than bad." His voice is small. It isn't good, admitting weakness, but Norway doesn't care. He enters Denmark's room, and finds it similar to his own. Just with more alcohol. Barrels of it. A dirty mirror, because Denmark's a vain devil. And a half-eaten brandy cream cake smuggled in from Switzerland. He is becoming richer, stronger. Norway knows. "Plague came from all directions," he says absentmindedly. "From Sverige, Finland, you, England... Both coast and land." Hm. Denmark has even allowed himself a window. Norway catches sight of a pile of bodies in an alley, swollen death, pale loose skin. They look like a merged organism, fat and white, a new species. Norway has spent years with Denmark. Years pressed inside small ship cabins, taking frustration or excitement out on each other's bodies, fucking like wild animals. Denmark has, for an example, a nasty bite-scar on his left ass-cheek. They've been at war, they've been allied, they've fought each other and they've fought together. They've known each other from they were kids, hunters, trading flint stone weaponry and wheat. Norway knows Denmark like the back of his hand.

And it is therefore Norway stills when he notices how Denmark is looking at him. Seizing him up. Judging him.

Norway bristles, but he is too exhausted and ill to show strength, but he tenses. He is not surprised. He recognizes the hunger for power which pests all Countries, inherited by their human counterparts. Whether it started in Denmark himself or his officials is uncertain. 

"Let's get you out of those clothes," Denmark says carefully, and goes to peel off the ragged excuse of clothes he wears. Norway would warn him but he's too tired. "We'll have to burn them. In case the miasma, or sin, or whatever, spreads." But his touch is soft and careful and Norway is so sick of fighting. He's been fighting for a year. He leans into the touch and ignores the gasp Denmark makes when his clothes—more like sewn-together cloth—fall to the floor. " _Fanden i Helvede_ ," he curses, "this is really bad, Norge. D'you have an estimate," Denmark quiets, "on how many dead?" Norway swallows thickly. He knows Denmark can see it, has learnt to read the signs. Small things. Bob of an Adam's apple. A shift. A slight narrowing of the eyes. Denmark exclaims, "You don't have to—"

"It's not so bad as it was but they're still... I can't tell... I..."

Denmark lays a hand on Norway's shoulder, sitting down on Denmark's bed with him. Carefully, Denmark asks, "How's Island?"

"Plague hasn't touched him." Yet. Iceland still pays taxes Norway and was his (despite refusing to become one with the Hereditary Kingdom of Norway in 1258 AD) so Norway could feel the surface of what was going on; Iceland's irritation over Norway's hirðstjórar (taxmen), but also frequent natural disasters like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, crop failures and epidemics. But no plague, no. "He's ceased our trade, closed off his docs. My brother is not stupid." 

"Aye. And your other colonies, what about them?" 

Colonies, yes, not brothers. Norway bars his teeth in a half-grin half-sneer at the mention. "Færøyene is not doing good. I'd guess about half the population's gone or going. Kid is gonna shrink even more." It'd probably fuck him up good, but he'd always been more religious than Norway. Norways chews on his cheek, concentrating. His previous king, Håkon V Magnusson, had directed his sight east instead of west. The connection to his Colonies is not what it once were. But he won't tell Denmark this. "Orknøyene and Hjaltland is doing a bit better, I think. Grønnland..." he shakes his head. "Maybe she's committed suicide again, I don't know. Feels pretty dead to me. Upholding the yearly ship I sent out there, Grønlandsknarren, will be tough." While Norway's speaking, Denmark is pushing him down on the bed. He removes his own clothes, and Norway isn't surprised to find him in a much better condition than himself. His skin isn't cold or black or rotten like parts of Norway's are. He starts by washing Norway's feet. He would mock him hadn't he been so deliriously weak that although there is nothing threatening about the situation, he is nervous. "Stop. Can you do something else?"

Denmark stares at him, but he's gone inside, as if some indefinable film covers his eyes. Thinking, proving Sweden wrong by being intelligent. Plotting.

They agree through movements and movements alone, and it is Norway who bottoms. It is very unlike previous encounters, were the sex sometimes looked like war, to Denmark being as careful as possible. He does not seem to mind Norway's deformities and derangement. His kisses are gentle. He's so close it's as if he's trying to sew them together using skin and rot and blood, like the hill of pale corpses in the backyard. (Norway, still half-mad, thinks it must be higher than Himmelbjerget; he'd smirk if he had the energy). He just lies there, exhausted, queasy, spread-eagled, as Denmark does all the work and starts to prepare him using a jar of grease. He's extremely careful, fucking him, Norway can see it. Each hiss and groan makes him slow down, search Norway's eyes for something, then continue his ritualistic treatment of something that was once so casual to the two of them. This new technique is unfamiliar, and it takes a while before Norway starts enjoying it. He hits the spot and Norway moans, never shameful.

"I prayed, y'know," Norway mumbles against Denmark's skin, "but no one came. No one helped. No one listened."

A pause.

**"Tonight I am your God."**

Norway's heart nearly rips itself out of his chest but it is Denmark who's above him, not Pesta. But Denmark wears the same expression: one of absolution. From there his pace quickens, to show a bit of egoism and malevolence, only stopping himself when Norway whines and claws his back, weakly. It is said weakness that makes him stop. In the past, Norway's nails would've drawn blood. Now, the lines only yellow slightly and vanish. Only when having established this does Denmark slow down, almost lazy, making it pleasurable again. Norway sees them fuck in the mirror behind Denmark and has to blink hard to convince himself it isn't an old woman's face staring back at him. Yet orgasm nears and Norway holds his breath. He feels Denmark's name rise to his lips like a prayer, but swallows it in surprise.

 

 

The bath is odd, ritualistic and systematic. There is a heavy involvement of spices and perfume and oil, foreign and traditional. Denmark washes him slowly, carefully, and his eyes are wide and gaze sharp. He is fully clothed. The atmosphere is lazy, erotic, and Norway is still delirious—but more hopeless and helpless now. Denmark sneaks a hand down onto the bath, down Norway's chest, doing it so slowly no water splashes. The other hand he uses to wrap around Norway's eyes, blinding him. While stroking Norway's cock, Denmark talks quietly about the future. He does so with excess detail regarding intent, an attitude of reasonableness in the face of implied silliness and the inability to hear a polite refusal. Under Denmark's hands, Norway keeps his eyes closed. 

He does not open them fully for 400 years.

**Author's Note:**

> all you need to know historically is that 
> 
> 1) Denmark took over Norway after Norway's royal and noble lineage died out, and Denmark-Norway (also called the Twin Realms) were united between 1380 to 1814 in various ways. Wergeland, big Norwegian writer during the National Romanticism, coined the term "firehundreårsnatten" (the four centuries night) for these 434 years. technically the night aspect is a myth because Norway flourished under Danish reign.
> 
> 2) one thirds of Denmark's population perished from the plague. contrast with Norway's two thirds. but Norway's weakening wasn't only because of the plague, it was a downhill slide because of dying nobility and bad kings, but the plague definitely did not help.


End file.
